No. 55 Aaron’s Dream Machine Toyota driver Mark Martin admits he isn’t big on reading NASCAR’s record book.
But he’s certainly rewriting it.
The Michael Waltrip Racing driver won his 56th career pole Friday in Phoenix moving past Bill Elliott and into sole possession of seventh place in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series all-time poles.
Martin remains the second oldest driver to win a pole. He was 54 years, 1 month and 4 days old last Friday at Phoenix. Gant won a pole at Bristol in 1994 when he was 54 years 7 months and 15 days old. Gant is still the oldest Sprint Cup winner visiting victory lane at Michigan in 1992 when he was 52.
Martin will look to take over that record this weekend when the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series visits Las Vegas Motor Speedway where he won the inaugural race in 1998 and posted six top-5 finishes in 15 starts at the 1.5-mile track.
MARTIN ON HARRY GANT: “Whether I was to break that record or not, I look at Harry Gant and don’t feel I measure. That’s just me. Records don’t mean much. I have the respect (for Gant) — I was there with him and had the pleasure of racing with him and beat by him on a regular occasion. I’ll always look at him as someone who accomplished more than I did. He was the guy I couldn’t beat at the time. He’s an incredible guy.”
WINNING 5 POLES IN 26 MWR RACES: “Rodney Childers (crew chief) and all the guys that work on the Aaron’s Dream Machine do such a nice job. The cars are just really nice and our power from Toyota has been great. Qualifying is tough these days and we are very proud of what we’ve been able to accomplish.”
LAS VEGAS: “We’ve had some success in Las Vegas winning the very first race in 1998. Sure, we can do that again. We led 75 laps Sunday so we know we’re capable of running well. We’ll just need to put the whole race together. But we can do that. These guys give me good cars each weekend. We’ll see what we can learn Thursday during the test and hopefully have something for them on Sunday. With this new Gen-6 car, the window of opportunity is open for all these teams to find something and have a big advantage over the rest of the field for several weeks.”
MWR PR
